Timeshare Boyfriend: A Steamy New Adult Enemies to Lovers Summer Romance Novel

Chapter 1: There Is No Love Like the First Love...Or the First Hate

The Next Summer, Five Years Later

Penny: It's been five years, are you sure he'll remember you?

I stared at my best friend's text message in the backseat of the car on the drive down to South Carolina. Since the first summer of the timeshare, Adam and I had not seen each other. His family either became too busy and had to rent the two weeks out to someone else while my family was there or vice versa. Now, five years later, we were going to be at the beach together for two weeks.

Me: I mean, he did swear his love to me.

Penny: He was eleven...

Me: What happened to a summer of positivity and optimism?

I knew it seemed like a stretch that sixteen-year-old Adam would feel as strongly for me as his eleven-year-old self did, but after seeing what high school freshman boys considered romantic, I couldn't help thinking about the boy who had said, "This is forever." The boy who skipped rocks and promised to kiss me. And gosh, was I ready for that first kiss. Fifteen and never been kissed. I had packed extra mints, mouthwash, and mint gum.

My fingers twisted the too-small-for-my-normal-fingers-so-now-it's-on-my-pinky turtle ring. I had saved it, waiting for a summer when we would both be back at the Myrtle Beach timeshare at the same time.

Penny: Realism happened. You've been fantasizing about this guy forever. What if he's horrific-looking?

Me: He won't be.

Penny: But what if he is? What if, within five years, he turned into the Hunchback of Notre Dame?

I began typing back a response, but Penny beat me to it.

Penny: And don't say you'll love him anyway. No one is that nice.

Me: He's not going to be ugly. He was a cute kid.

Penny: Cute kids either turn ugly or hot. Sixty/forty.

I laughed, and my dad turned around to smile at me from the passenger seat of the car. I nodded at him before focusing my attention back on my phone.

The truth was, I was not at all worried about whether or not Adam would be attractive. I knew he would be. I worried most about what he would think of me.

Me: What if he's out of my league? What if he takes one look at me and decides I'm the Hunchback of Notre Dame?

Penny: Hush your entirely wrong and stupid mouth. If he dares to not think you are the most beautiful girl he has ever seen, I will personally drive down there and strangle him with his own pool noodle.

Me: 1. You are fifteen and do not have a driver's license. 2. Was the "pool noodle" an innuendo or do you think he'll actually be using one?

Penny: If he is sixteen and still doesn't know how to swim without a noodle, then he doesn't deserve you.

Me: Thanks.

She realized her mistake.

Penny: Damn, I forgot you still don't know how to swim.

Deep bodies of water terrified me from a young age. During my summer with Adam, he had entertained me in the shallow end among kids half our age just so I felt less alone. Swoon.

Me: It's okay. Maybe this is the year I'll learn.

I fantasized about Adam teaching me how to swim: his warm hand on my back as he showed me how to float. Him diving after me if I started to drown. Maybe a minute or two or seven of mouth-to-mouth...